


Beyond my control

by sternflammenden



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-11
Updated: 2014-06-11
Packaged: 2018-02-04 05:20:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1766995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sternflammenden/pseuds/sternflammenden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barbrey blames Roose for Bethany and Domeric's death. </p>
<p>Fic is set a few months after Bethany dies, pre-series.</p>
<p>Written for LJ's asoiafkinkmeme.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beyond my control

“Where have you been?” 

She knows that Roose is not concerned, that he did not miss her presence or trouble himself with her absence. Barbrey does not yield to sentiment where her goodbrother is concerned, choosing to see the man behind the carefully-constructed mask of courtesy that he shows to the world. It is more like a void, she knows, a blank space where a life might have been, where things like feeling and thought are washed away in favor of a blank pragmatism that never falters. She shakes her head at this gesture, this waste of time. He knows where she has been. She does not pass a visit to the Dreadfort without paying her respects below. 

Her footsteps had echoed queerly in the hushed space, her meager candle providing little visibility in the gloom that pervaded the area beneath the holdfast. The Bolton family crypt was a lonely place, little visited, as evidenced by the thick dust that had been allowed to collect on the floor, her own steps the first to disturb the filth in gods knew how long. She had walked by the row of tombs, the first crumbling, containing nothing more than ancestral dust that had borne witness to the Age of Heroes, the marble brought from the cliffs at White Harbor now mottled with neglect. Then she passed the resting places of old Bolton lords proper, from the time when they’d bent their reluctant knees to the Stark Kings in the North, dark sovreigns in their own right perhaps, cloaking themselves in their enemies’ skins. Little good it did them in death. Barbrey smiled at the thought, remembering her own family’s jesting remarks on the matter, always carefully made when young Lord Bolton had been far from Ryswell lands.

The smile, however bitter, faded from her face when she reached the farthest reach of the vault. Here was Roose Bolton’s father and mother, a flayed man in all of its wailing horror carved on the lid of the former’s resting place, the latter unadorned and blank, as though an afterthought. And then came the smaller sepulchers, all nameless. Her sister’s children, a monument to infant mortality, dead son upon dead son. 

Bethany had been so distraught with each one, regarding them all as a failure, then as a condemnation. 

She drew in her breath as she came to the next tomb, just now beginning to show the ravages of dampness. With the river so near, it was inevitable that rot would set in from the dampness from the Wailing Water, but she had always regarded the pristine condition of Domeric’s grave as something beyond the pale, a message from the gods perhaps, or a judgment. But now…

But here was her sister’s resting place, still pristine, for she was only a few months gone, a horse’s head newly graven upon its lid. Barbrey traced the lines of the head and mane with a finger that trembled more as she drew the length of the animal’s neck. Such a tribute seemed a mockery to her, considering how little regard she knew Lord Bolton to bear for her natal house, seeing Ryswell as nothing more than a means to an end, to beget an heir, to cement an alliance in the tenuous early years when he had first come into his title and lands. And she remembered how Bethany had been enveloped by the stillness of this place, her sharp observations muted by the thick grey stone walls that formed the Dreadfort, dampened by the weight of Bolton ancestry, which paid more service to peace at any price than the hearty dissent that echoed through the Rills. She remembered how Bethany’s voice had once joined hers at table, making a jest at one of their brothers’ expense, or discussing some issue of animal husbandry with their father. And she remembered too, how she had altered, how she had sat, wrapped in a pink mantle, her son, a living heir at last, at her breast, a serene image of motherhood despite her drawn features and her reddened eyes. A marble statue, with her husband, equally frozen, looming over them both. 

Barbrey pulled back, tightening hands into fists, allowing the pain to spread as her nails bit into her palms. The sensation was unpleasant, although it was also somehow satisfying, and the anger was preferable to sorrow. She had cried far too many tears for them both, her sister and nephew, and her eyes were dry as she relaxed, finding a handkerchief in her reticule, wiping first the bloody crescents from her palms, and then clearing, most gently, the accumulated dust and grime from Bethany’s tomb. 

“Where have you been?” her goodbrother says as she stands before the fire. Barbrey is not cold, the blood in her veins now alight with a self-righteous sort of rage, but she does not permit it to overpower her. It would be foolish, here, in the face of such control, such marvelous restraint. Still, she turns her back to the flames, facing Roose Bolton, a tight smile on her face. 

“I was in the crypts.”

“I see,” he replies, his face unchanged by her revelation. Roose has never been one for sentiment, acknowledging his son’s unfortunate death with a shake of the head, and perhaps a tinge of regret, showing even less feeling when Bethany succumbed to the fever that killed her.

“Someone should bear witness to it,” Barbrey says softly. There is something about the Dreadfort that stills her, and it is times like these when she begins to understand her sister, and how things changed so quickly. There is a deadly stillness here, almost a timelessness, that cools her blood and fogs her mind. It is almost as if she had been leeched, she thinks, and almost laughs at the idea. “Someone should be accountable for such great loss.” She stares at Roose, as though challenging him, but he does not rise to the bait. 

They have played this game before, over and over again. 

“There is no sense on dwelling on what has been,” Roose says, his face lit by the flickering flames, pale skin and eyes turned an unnatural red from their glow. “I have mourned enough.” 

“Some would say not,” Barbrey says, an edge to her voice. She glances towards the corner of the room, where a large red dog lies in an unruly heap, deep in slumber. Its legs twitch as though it dreams of the hunt, of sharpened blades, hot pursuit, and cornered prey. A pair of muddy boots, far too large for her goodbrother, lies on the flagstones beside the animal. 

Such a gesture is not lost on Roose. Her intention, albeit subdued, is far too clear. “I need not justify my decisions to you, Lady Dustin,” he says. 

“I do not ask you to,” she replies softly. “I know well that you will not. But I would find the crypts so much more bearable were another laid there, in place of my sister.” She shakes her head. “And her child.” 

“Cursed is the kinslayer,” Roose says. Something in the fire pops, and the wood sets up a hiss. The sound is almost deafening, and Barbrey jumps, despite herself. 

“Kinslaying is one thing, murder another,” she murmurs. “And revenge a better thing by far.”

Roose bites his lip. Barbrey wonders if he feels the pain, if he feels anything aside from a vague annoyance at her presence and her words. “I am more concerned with heirs,” he says, “as your sister was unable to provide them.” He smiles as her face darkens at that, eyes narrowing. Barbrey buries her hands in her skirts, thrusting them deep within the fabric so that he will not see how they clench as they had in the crypt, more painful now as old wounds are reopened. “What else could I have done?” he says, seemingly to himself. “It was entirely beyond my control.” 

Barbrey feels the warmth in her palm, and wishes that it were another’s blood that she spilled, imagining the satisfying feeling of it flowing down her hands, staining her skin a vicious red. But there was nothing to be done now. Nothing to be done but wait and keep silent and whet the knife that she bore in her breast, hoping that one day, it could be unsheathed.


End file.
